Portable exercise devices permitting multiple exercises to be performed are well known. Of general background interest are U.S. Pat. No. 5,911,535 of Groich issued Jun. 15, 1999, U.S. Pat. No. 4,580,778 of Van Noord issued Apr. 8, 1986, U.S. Pat. No. 4,951,941 of Resk issued Aug. 28, 1990, U.S. Pat. No. 4,290,600 of Kölbel issued Sep. 22, 1981, U.S. Design Pat. No. Des. 408,063 of Van Der Hoeven et al., issued Apr. 13, 1999, U.S. Pat. No. 4,239,212 of Hickey issued Dec. 16, 1980, U.S. Design Pat. No. U.S. D460,795 of Fitzpatrick issued Jul. 23, 2002, U.S. Pat. No. 5,509,879 of Lanzagorta issued Apr. 23, 1996 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,695,436 of Huang issued Dec. 9, 1997.
Also of interest are U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,315,701 of Shifferaw issued Nov. 13, 2001 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,257,592 of Jones issued Mar. 24,1981, which describe and illustrate bars with expandible ropes extending from their ends to permit a variety of exercises. Limited numbers of exercises are possible with the exercise devices of Morgan U.S. Design Pat. No. Des. 405,133 issued Feb. 2, 1999, Chang U.S. Pat. No. 5,637,066 issued Jun. 10, 1997, Van Straaten U.S. Pat. No. 5,697,873 issued Dec. 16, 1997 which teach various arrangements of bars with parts relatively moveable with respect to each other under bias, to permit exercising. Jang U.S. Pat. No. 5,031,906 issued Jul. 16, 1991 describes and illustrates a bar type exercising machine in which the moveable components are biased by means of a piston type arrangement against relative movement. U.S. Pat. No. 5,232,425 issued Aug. 3, 1993 describes an elastic band-biased bar type exercise device for abdominal muscles.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a portable personal exercise device which is simple and economic in construction and which will permit a large number of exercises to be carried out.